1) The “Wait Wait” pilot. At least the taping part. And I think it went very well. More soon….

2) John McCain. At least it looks that way…

Just so’s you know:

The news of the taping has gone public. The time’s a-comin’.

Things seem to be shaping up nicely for it. Although I’m a little disturbed by the radical plastic surgery Carl has undergone for the occasion.

You know what would be shocking?

John McCain helping some deal get passed in the middle of the day today. That would be shocking.

Yes, imagine how surprising it would be if John McCain got House Republicans to agree, in principle, to a deal at, oh, say, 3 PM EDT today. Wouldn’t that be unexpected?

Because then he could fly down to Mississippi, and the press coverage would be dominated by watching him arrive at the airport, which would be very dramatic and wholly unexpected. And then the narrative would be about watching his motorcade and “Will he make it to the debate on time, or will he actually just stride into the town hall meeting IN PROGRESS!? ” Just stride in there and crash Obama’s little party at the last minute, the Maverick, his important job done, now ready to return to the trivial business of campaigning that his shortsighted opponent seems so obsessed with… wow, that would be a fine howdya-do, wouldn’t it?

Yes it would. It would be very, very surprising, shocking, and theatrical. You can’t script stuff like that.

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[UPDATE: Only a few minutes after I posted this, John McCain announced that he’s a-comin! So the airport drama that would’ve surprised me so much might not happen (although I don’t know if he’s made it out of Washington yet). It is possible that his campaign is in even deeper disarray than I thought.]

Just because I’m working day and night (literally) doesn’t mean you can’t run barefoot through the grassy fields of Fanatical Apathy.  Have at it!

Updates:  The “Wait Wait” thing is coming along nicely, this week’s “Real Time” looks great, and Sebastian likes carrots.

Also, a tip:   I spend a lot of time perusing fivethirtyeight, and I recommend it highly.  Not only is it a fascinating statistical approach to predicting the election (baseball fans will appreciate the proprietor’s hardcore sabermetrics pedigree), the writing and new battleground road-trip field reporting is top-notch.

Okay, I’ve just returned home after a 16 hour day and itzzzzzzzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…..

David Foster Wallace’s suicide isn’t an easy thing to bear. Peter Sagal put it beautifully. There are writers of great insight, but they tend to be either didactic or obscure. There are writers with shocking beautiful style, but they’re usually shallow or mired in pretense. And there are writers who communicate with startling immediacy and force, but they usually mine sentimentality or aggressively pointless realism.

David Foster Wallace had more insight, style and force than any writer I can think of, and at his best he added to this a blinding brilliance that could make you read the same sentence again and again until it wrestled you to the ground and forced you to take a moment to sit back and think about it rather than plunging forward simply because there was another sentence on the other side of that punctuation mark. And I’m pretty sure that this was the point to his ceaseless footnoting and internal distractions that turned his best work into a kind of hyperlink-rich self-contained web; David Foster Wallace took great pains to make you read, rather than let the act of reading become an end unto itself. Reading’s a drug like any other, and Wallace wouldn’t serve up a soporific, not when he had something to say. Which was frequently.

I don’t think there’s a better novel out there than “Infinite Jest.”

And here I am critiquing his work, basically because I have nothing to say about his death. I can’t decode it. Can I pretend to have seen traces of it in his more recent work? Was he diabolically and infinitely entertained by something that he had no hope of regaining? Did it involve our current political circus and his rather unique connection to John McCain?

No, probably not. Probably not any of that, really. Writers, like everyone, have private lives (well, most do. There are a couple I’m not so sure of). And those private lives are much more important and complicated than anything that hits the page.

I’m angry. I resent this. I don’t want to pick up anything to read right now, because he’s not going to be there. And the bulk of what passes for “good” writing these days is not worth the wear and tear on our constantly-deteriorating eyeballs. Even the so-called best; most of them, at this moment, seem like glib and ungrounded pretenders, glorified campfire entertainers who are prized for their amazing ability to scoff at newfound stereotypes or describe uncatalogued minutia.

Not just them - I include me in that. It’s a bad night. Naturally, I’ll forgive myself and all my fellow writers in the morning. But right now I can’t help but feel that the best of us is gone.

[Note: I wrote this a couple of nights ago, and didn’t post it right away, thinking I’d have more to add. I don’t. I’m still as close to speechless as I ever get….]

“Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me” is possibly coming to television.

Yes, I am involved. But only on nights and weekends, which, like a calling plan, is when I’m free.

So, now you know why blogging activity has slowed to a trickle. It’s a busy month here at Felber Central. I hope you’ve been enjoying “Real Time” as much as I have, and that you’re as hysterically unsettled by the tone and direction of this campaign. It’s Palintastic!

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[UPDATE: Oh, stop worrying folks. The radio show will continue regardless. I promise. Peter promises. It’s okay.]

I’ve been turbo-busy these days, though I can’t yet confirm or deny any of the speculations in our comments sections. [Move along, nothing to see here…]

Meanwhile, though, please enjoy Pirate Baz, in an outfit fashioned by SeattleTammy. Terrifying, no?  With ferocity and reckless abandon, he rules the… softer, carpeted areas of the entire…room

As you might’ve guessed, all of my writing energy has been devoted to “Real Time” during this Insane last seven days of politics. [I hope you enjoyed this week’s show and/or podcast]

But you can expend your energy here. I’ll be back soon. Leave a light on for me, and together we’ll strive to build a bridge to nowhere and deny it later.

Tonight I chose to watch the convention on MSNBC. Sue me, I’m a sucker for the classic vaudeville team of Olbermann & Matthews (remember the time they got a job as waiters at the ‘04 RNC, were put in charge of the pie cart, and wackiness ensued!? A gem!).

Anyway, my point: After Governor Warner spoke - a likable speech that probably failed to burn any barns (not even the really old, dry ones that serve as a disposal site for oily rags and loose roman candles) - I watched about 10 minutes of Bill Clinton settling in, Michelle Obama introducing her mom to Joe Biden and Jimmy Carter, and general milling. As I listened to the entire MSNBC team constantly re-ask each other the same questions (”What does Hillary have to do tonight?” “Will it convince the Clinton loyalists?” “Where’s the pie cart?”), I had the vague impression of a friendly-looking portly man hopping around on the stage. He was good enough to stop talking when MSNBC returned to the stage for the “Hillary’s So Cool” video package and subsequent speech (a good one, I thought).

15 minutes later, the chatty MSNBC panel was beginning to dissect the night. The consensus? Not enough “red meat,” overall, an idea they’ve been cultivating for a couple of days and one that seemed to really enrage some of the panel - where’s the Bush-bashing? Where’s the McCain clobbering? The Democrats might be messing this up!

I have to say, they had me persuaded.

Until… later tonight, whilst relaxing, I happened to have CNN on in the background as they replayed the night. I wasn’t really watching. Honest. I have a life!

But my attention was grabbed when they got to the hopping man. Because CNN aired his speech. He was Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer, and he was terrific.

Wow, huh? That’s politics tartare right there, meat fans. Love the speech or not, it’s definitely what some of the commentators were looking for. Four More Months!

The MSNBC crowd never saw it. They were too busy talking about the need for the very thing they were talking over.

What does it prove? Not that MSNBC sucks, no, though they certainly missed something special. I’m just pointing out that perhaps “instant analysis” is… well… useless. And somewhat dangerous. It’s too “instant” to be well-thought-out - really, it’s more entertainment than news or actual analysis. So it’s basically a practice that tries to tell the audience how to think about something before it’s actually been thought about. By anyone.

Back at the desk, pundits running the gamut from Rachel Maddow to Pat Buchanan chattered on about a convention night that they hadn’t actually seen all the way through. Maybe they can catch it on the YouTubes.

Throughout a long writing day, I’ll be here handicapping Obama’s VP options. Sorry for the shorthand, but I’m not going to able to present with my usual polish, particularly not when they’re being threatened by the Russians like that.

Hillary Clinton
Sure, why not? She can deliver all those Democrats who love her so much they now say they’re going to vote for McCain. Then again, anyone who thinks petulance is a good reason to load up the Supreme Court with McCain’s picks and get into another couple dozen wars… well, I’m not sure they’ll even believe that it’s really Hillary up there next to Obama and not some clever cyborg sent to cloud their minds. And let’s be realistic - they’re not going to ruin everything by voting for McCain. They’re going to do the traditional liberal thing and ruin everything by voting for Nader.

Joe Biden
The smart money seems to be flowing towards Biden in recent days, and he does seem to have had a radical shoe-ectomy performed on his mouth. He’d be a terrific attack dog, because he’s got the ability to be clear, forceful, and funny. Also, he’s articulate and clean. It’s like a storybook, man!

And…. that’s all folks  (I said it was a long writing day).  If Obama continues to tease, perhaps there will be more tomorrow.  Or you can take matters into your own hands below.